The next delivery to the ISS is planned by SpaceX’s Dragon cargo ship on June 19.

-‘Right to spring surprises’-

Igor Lisov, an editor at the industry magazine Cosmonautics News, said the accident was out of the ordinary, noting that the Progress vessel is a reliable workhorse.

“Around 100 Progress vessels have been launched since 1978,” he told AFP. “On the whole it is a very reliable system.”

Independent space expert Vadim Lukashevich said that the mishap should not be seen as a catastrophe.

“There were no cosmonauts on board, no one will die,” he told AFP. “Equipment, especially when it is so complex, has every right to spring surprises — especially after so many years of service.”

The Russian space programme is renowned for having sent the first man into space in 1961 and launching the first satellite, Sputnik 1, four years earlier, and its achievements remain a major source of national pride.

But more recently it has endured a series of setbacks, notably losing expensive satellites and a similar Progress supply ship in 2011.

That vessel crashed into Siberia shortly after launch in one of Russia’s biggest space setbacks.